What We're Doing

Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday to you! It was MJ's first birthday yesterday and it was great! Everybody here and MJ's grandma, grandpa, and aunt went to Jen and Marceaux's house to celebrate.

 Opening Presents

 A Ball!

Jen and Marceaux's anniversary is on the same day as MJ's birthday! So today, they left for a couple of days to relax. But what about MJ? Well, Trish went over to their house to babysit. She is really excited to spend the whole day with him.

Every once in a while, people will come to us asking if we can do things for them like paint, stain, or build something. Well, the last couple of days Karol has been going into Crivitz to do some painting. She has been painting doors and hutches.

Today, Tony went up north with his mom and dad to visit Dan's grave and decorate it. He took Anthony with him and will be back on Saturday.

Since everybody else was gone today, Molly did some cleaning work in the office. She also is finishing up going through all of the supplies for the thank you cards that the campers make at camp.

The Able Church Workday

This past Saturday, we had an Able Church workday! There was about twenty people that came up to Camp Daniel to help us get stuff done.

 Pastor Tim was working on the John Deere and turning it back into a lawn mower.

 Jake, Jim, Tony, Dale, and Marceaux were sanding the semi trailer and getting it ready to be painted.

 Kenny, Jeff, Nick, Richard, Crystal, Brian, and Ben were putting dirt up by the dorms, so we can plant grass and plants up there.

 While we were all outside working, somebody had to make lunch. Trish was in the Hartley House making spaghetti and garlic bread. She was having some trouble with the burners, though. They wouldn't start. Eventually, she got them working and the food was excellent!

 Karol was doing a couple of different things. In the picture above, she was decorating treasure chests for our pirate themed meals at camp. Below, she was helping Jen, Richard, Janice, and Dawn grout the tiles in the Trapline Lodge.

 Molly, Justin, Chuck, Katie, Peter, Dawn, Pete, Cheryl, Linda, Jenny, and Amy were putting mulch in the gardens in front of the office, Hartley House, and behind the snack stand. They also swept the pathway, raked out the bocce ball court, and put some dirt on the lawn so we can plant some grass where there are bare spots in the grass.

Camp Update

We are getting ready to pour concrete around the camp! We are going to pour some by the Hartley House, around the Trapline Lodge, and by the garage. Justin is really excited because his wheelchair doesn't like the sand very much. Tony and the guys have been putting together the concrete forms to shape the cement.

Karol, Jen, and Trish have been working on T-shirts for this year's summer camp. The Factory (craft cabin) is now being used for it's intended purpose, crafts! All I'm going to say is that the shirts are really cool!

Karol, Trish, Jen, and Molly also took a food safety class for this summer. They have also been meeting with each other to start planning meals for camp. They have been working in the garden in front of the office pulling weeds and making it look nice.

Durring camp, Molly is in charge of thank you cards that the campers make. We send out these thank you cards to people who donate their time and money. She has been printing out blank thank you cards for the campers to decorate and making sure we have enough supplies for the campers to use.

We have an Able Church work day this weekend and we are using the bus to transport everybody. However, it didn't work, so Marceaux had to fix it. Now that the snow is gone, the snow blower can come off of the John Deere, and the mower can be put back on. Marceaux is going to be working on that.

Dance for Disability is coming up on June 2nd! We ordered some new speakers and stand for the dance and camp. Justin and Anthony put them together to make sure that they will work. Justin also created a new page on our website about the dance. The page is called D4D. The Able Church is meeting tomorrow night and Justin is giving a message about anger. He has been getting ready for that.

Camp is Coming!

We've been pretty busy here at Camp Daniel. A lot of things need to get done now that camp is soon arriving.

A lot of camper and counselor manuals have been coming in and need to be entered into the computer. Molly has been working on that. She has also been working on Camp's new counselor manual. Molly also spent the week babysitting for some friends of ours while they went on vacation.

Trish and Karol have been working on the grounds fertilizing, cutting the grass, and gardening. Trish has also been raking the leaves with the guys. We need christmas cookies for camp this summer, and Trish has been trying to find people to help make them.

Jen and Marceaux have been working on getting out information for the Dance 4 Disability. They have been attending the Bible class for adults with disabilities in Marinette that meets bi-weekly and are continuing to make connections with the disability community in Marinette. Marceaux has also been fixing the lawn mowers and golf carts. Some other exciting news: MJ started walking and will be turning one on the 22nd!

We just recently purchased the new operating system for the Apple computers. Justin and Anthony have been installing it on the computers. Justin and Molly recently traveled to Minneapolis for a doctor's appointment for Justin. They stayed at Larry and Carolyn Campbell's house and had some time to catch up with them.

Tony and the guys have been going around camp and planting 400-500 trees!! They are all planted too!  They have also been getting ready to start pouring cement down by the garage, up by the dorm, and up by the house too.

A couple of Saturdays ago, we had a work day. A group led by Katrina, and Jen's two cousins, came up to do some grouting!

Spring is Here!

Spring is here and camp is only two months away! It's time to get ready! So, what have we been doing to get ready? Well...

Marceaux has been getting everybody's golf carts up and running after a long winter hibernation. For some reason, they all seem to break during the winter when they're not being used. Karol's cart was the only one working just fine. Tony's muffler had holes in it and was broken off. Tony Sr's wasn't running correctly, and Justin's battery doesn't hold a charge and the belt keeps slipping.

Justin has been printing off address labels with Molly so we could send out brochures about our fourth annual Dance 4 Disability. He also finished importing all of the contacts from Tony Sr's computer into all of our Mac computers. We have an old Dell computer that has never been backed up before and has vital information on it that we use for camp. It's now backed up.

Trish has been busy in the kitchen as we have had workdays here for the past three Saturdays in a row. She has also been studying and getting ready for a food safety test. Also, she has been working with the guys out side putting out all of the picnic tables, chairs, and benches.

Jen and Tim have been looking for sponsors and participants for Dance 4 Disability. And Molly has been going through all of the incoming applications for this years camp and updating them in the computer.

These past couple of weeks, Tony and Karol have been on a well deserved vacation to Cancun! While they were down there they met up with a couple of friends of theirs. They had a blast! The best part about this was that they brought back all of this warmth and sunshine with them. The lake here at Camp Daniel is now officially melted! Pretty soon our lakefront is going to look like this again!

Exciting Information

These past couple of weeks, we have all been tiling the bathrooms in the unfinished dorm. Rick Bub and his friend have also been coming up here to help us out. It has been a very long process as we ake on this project.

It is, however, starting to look more and more like a bathroom every day!

Tim Kelly has been coming up here this week to work with the guys on pouring the countertops for the sink. 

Before

After

This is looking great and is very exciting to see all of the progress. As you can see in this picture, there is a mirror above the countertop. We ordered some mirrors for the bathrooms to hang above the sinks. 

There is some exciting news! Trish now has her very own blog! As some of you probably know, she is a huge Elvis fan! So what is the title of her blog? "Welcome to Grace-land" Pretty clever, huh? If you would like to visit her blog, go to www.trishsgraceland.blogspot.com

Justin has been working on the Camp Daniel website the last couple of days. Since we just got done talking about Trish's blog, we might has well say that she now has her own page on the Camp Daniel website too! She is going to become very popular! Justin also added a donate page on the website. You can now donate to Camp Daniel online through PayPal. However, if you would rather send in your donation through the mail, that is fine too.

Camp Daniel Update

A lot has been going on up here lately. Rick Bub has been coming up here and tilling the bathrooms in the dorm with the guys. They have been cutting the tile, laying it out, and grouting it. It is a big and long project but it is getting done. On Monday, Rick took the guys down to Milwaukee to see the Harley Davidson museum. They loved it! There were old motorcycles from WWII, new motorcycles and everything in between.

Most of you have probably heard about Karol. She has been having some pain and the doctors heard a weird sound in her abdomen. Here is the latest update from Little Tony.

"She has been diagnosed with an arterial dissection of the superior mesenteric artery, this means that her artery that provides blood to her intestines and some organs, has had a tear on the inside. Our arteries are layered like a rolled up piece of paper. Something caused a tear in the inner layer (this happens with out known cause, but it is not normal) when this happens it can have many outcomes, in Karol's case, it caused the blood to be rerouted between the layers of the artery. When it entered the layers it may have been blocked for a short period and eventually rerouted itself back thru the inner layer of the artery wall. This was misinterpreted by the radiologist at Bellin Hospital as simply a mass, as it appeared on the original cta scan. The reality is that it is a bulge or deformity in the artery stemming from the tear, (the bulge is NOT an aneurism) the radiologist wrongly interpreted inflammation and mass that was not there.

The treatment is simply to watch the area over the next year. She will have another Ct scan in 2 months, 6 months and then a year to monitor any changes here at Froetdert hospital in Milwaukee. 

She is not physically limited in anyway and cannot do any damage to the artery through physical exertion. The pain she felt, which began in church on palm sunday and lasted for 4 days, was due to the tear and subsequent rerouting. Once the blood began flowing again the pain went away. They anticipate no further complications, as she is healthy and through all of the tests and scans proven to be in great shape! So of all possibilities that where put forth by the Drs we have met with in the week we feel incredibly blessed with this diagnosis. Even with the tear, she has had the best possible outcome with it, as other people who have experienced this have had total blockages, severe bleeding, among other scary outcomes.

The vascular Surgeon, who is the chairman of that dept. here, commended our PA, Jessica in Crivitz, for hearing something most GP's would not. Along the way we encountered caring Drs. and nurses and had many opportunities to share the mission of Camp Daniel as well as build relationships with new and old friends. God has even allowed the healing of some scared relationships in this time, which we are so thankful for.

Lastly, we have experienced a level of love from so many we cannot even begin to express what it feels like. Over 250 of you have reached out in person, thru texts, emails and Facebook. Our theme this year at Camp Daniel is LOVE, and now we have humbly understood the power of Gods love shown by others in a new way. We come away from this changed in our love for each other, for each of you and most important, in how we love and understand the degree of Gods love for us. We thank God for all of you, and covet your continued prayer of thanks to God, as He keeps us walking the path towards His purpose, bypassing our limited plans!"

We are all very thankful that this is nothing worse. Thank you all for your prayers and support during all of this.